Lupus and Gut Health: Food Sensitivity Patterns Part 1

Since my family has turned our attention to food sensitivities, I've seen some patterns emerge. Some trends yield amazing results, others are just annoying - but all are providing a window into what makes our bodies function. If you're considering an elimination diet, or your doctor's recommended one, I'm here to vouch for them. Even if the results aren't what you want them to be, at least you'll start making sense of what's happening to your body and why. 

Here are two of the patterns that we've seen play out: 

1) After cutting out a food, like gluten, you may become more sensitive to it, rather than less. 

This was kind of a bummer revelation for me. I think I'd assumed that if I eliminated a food from my diet for a significant period, over time, my body would no longer see it as a threat, and wouldn't react to it. This might have been based on my previous attempts to cut out foods or drinks - like decaf coffee, chocolate, gluten, or dairy. I'd give up a food, experience positive results while abstaining, and then after 6 weeks or so, if I had a cup of decaf or a scoop of ice cream, it wouldn't bother me. But gluten seems to be a different animal. For example, we were out of gluten free bread last week. Deirdre found alternative options - GF tortillas, rice, GF pitas - but I was stubborn. I didn't want to disrupt my routine of eating a piece of peanut butter toast every morning. So I went off script and used this delicious Italian loaf we get from Aldi. After three days, my skin was screaming at me to stop. Just one piece each day, and I had an internal revolt on my hands. (But then, as humans often do, I doubled down on gluten. I ate a few regular, gluten-filled waffles we baked to take to a friend's house, and then ate some gluten-rich cookies, and that's when my body said absolutely not, you need to eat gluten free.)

And, yes, while I pushed my gluten consumption beyond its limits, it was clear that just a few pieces of toast a couple days in a row were enough to set off my symptoms. Ugh. 

I originally cut back on gluten as a sign of solidarity when my daughter was asked to go gluten free by her functional medicine doctor. I wasn't having any real side effects from gluten, but once we gave it up, my husband and I definitely felt better without it. Which leads me to my next point...

2) When you give up a food, you can see benefits almost immediately. Why can't you see the disadvantages while you're consuming it day after day? 

Now, putting aside foods you are sensitive to, whenever I get a wild hair and decide to cut back on, say, sugar, the first to go is dessert. I just stop eating sweets, and almost overnight, I see benefits. Inflammation I didn't know I had goes down, my stomach gets flatter, my GI system runs better, and my skin gets less blotchy. But when I'm eating the dessert day after day, my body isn't calling out for help. It's not saying no thank you. It's not throwing up smoke signals. It doesn't really give me any indication that what I'm eating isn't a good idea (unless, like I said, there's a sensitivity.) It often takes weeks before I see the disadvantages of eating it. So here's my question - why doesn't our body send up bigger red flags? 

Or are the red flags more like pink memos that are vying for our attention, but get lost in and among all the other signals our body is giving us? Or are we deliberately ignoring them? Questions for another post, for sure! 

Patterns three and four revealed on the next blog!